Auto Industry Bailout?

I had this whole post written out about the financial markets and the auto industry bailout and how it might be similar to the French government ownership of their auto industry when i realized that I didn't know anything about French government ownership of auto industries.

so...I went to where we all go now when we don't know things...

and discovered that the French government hasn't really owned major stakes in any of their auto industries in over 10 years. So what was I thinking? Aeronautics. But that doesn't have anything to do with what we are talking about in the US. So my point was invalid. But I'll make it anyway.

If we bailout our auto industry, we will not be any different from other major industrialized countries (like France). I was not going to say it was a good thing (cause I do NOT thing it would be a good thing), but it would not be the TRAVESTY that so many believe it would be. I'm not an economist, but I've taken more economics classes than the average person and I listen to NPR more than the average person and listen to less sensationalized CNN than the average person and I have no idea what to do about our crappy world economy. It's down and up and down and up; all I know is that I've been in the workforce for about...4 months now, I've put over $200 into my retirement fund and it's worth about $20. And that sucks. I could have put that money into clothes and it would be worth more! That sounds ignorant. How did I get away from France?
Right...my ingorance about the French auto industry. So, turns out, Renault was bought by the French government in the aftermath of World War II (because its CEO had been killed and the company had cooperated with the Nazis, assets were being seized in order to avoid a future state catastrophe) and it was being managed privately, but owned by the state, often at large losses. Eventually, the French government pushed the company to success and it was privatized in the mid-1990s, but even still, the French state owns more than 15% of the company.

In the case of other French car makers, the French government has often intervened to avoid a major collapse of Citroën, but has never owned or had a major bailout of the company (mainly organizing major talks about selling partial groups). So although the French government has never wholly owned major stakes in most companies, it has always seen it in their interest to ensure that the companies were doing well (and good things in the case of Renault and the Nazis).

So what does this have to do with America and our auto bailout? If we are looking for precedent, I think we can look at the idea of pushing for talks of semi-mergers and joint supply lines, etc, but not a multi-million dollar bailout. I think we see that it is not in America's interest to do that. If France, (remember, they are the "socialist" ones!), can't do it, can we?

But we also have to look at what would happen if our auto industry were to go under: then we will be completely dependent upon other countries for a major part of our economy and life in America. I'm not ready to make the judgment that this would be such a bad thing, but many are. Has bailing out the auto industry become an issue of national security? Perhaps the funds should come from the defense budget instead! We all know that they have enough money to cover 25 billion...

I am having a difficult time reading through the French news about their plans for saving the economy right now. Anyone else seeing the plans? Sarkozy isn't going to save the world by himself (like Obama can), but he has to have plans right?